The Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Mr S. Jaipal Reddy, will dedicate the Rs 4,000-crore Capacity Expansion & Modernization Project - Phase II (CEMP-II) of Bharat Petroleum Kochi Refinery to the nation on Friday.
This is probably one of the largest capital investments in Kerala and is slated to enhance BPCL Kochi Refinery’s capacity from 7.5 million tonnes per annum to 9.5 MTPA which will cater to the increased demand for petroleum products.
The refinery is now well equipped to produce Euro III and Euro IV compliant fuels and with this current upgradation, the total refining capacity for the BPCL group now stands at 30.5 MTPA.
The capacity increase at Kochi Refinery entailed revamping of one of the existing Crude Distillation Units. Major new facilities like Vacuum Gas Oil Hydro-Desulphurisation (VGOHDS) Unit, Continuous Catalyst Regeneration Unit, Naphtha Hydro Treater Unit and Sulphur Recovery Unit have been set up.
A Captive Power Plant having a generation capacity of 36 Mega Watts is another feature of the project. In addition, auxiliaries, utilities and offsite facilities such as Boilers, Tankages and Despatch facilities for catering to additional requirements have been set up.
The Phase-I of this CEMP-I was completed in 2005. Subsequent to the completion of CEMP-I, Kochi Refinery started producing auto fuels conforming to BS-II specifications.
The refinery is at present fully equipped to make Euro-III grade Petrol (Motor Spirit or Gasoline) and partly conform to Euro IV standard in Diesel. The newly commissioned facilities will help in improving the fuel quality and reduce environmental pollution.
With the implementation of these facilities, the sulphur level in Motor Spirit will stand reduced and Benzene content to 1 vol.% from 5 vol.% while Octane number has been increased to 91 from 88 to improve the engine performance.
In the case of High Speed Diesel, the sulphur level in the fuel has been reduced to 150 ppm from 500 ppm in the case of Euro-III and to 50 ppm in the case of Euro-IV. To improve the fuel and ignition quality, a new specification for Cetane number has also been introduced.